Robots etc.

I’m currently the coach of our First Lego League robotics team, the Cougarbots. Yesterday was the culmination of months if preparation, as we had our annual qualifying tournament. I’ll spare you the suspense– we didn’t qualify to go on. However, as I always tell my team, it’s about the journey and not the destination.

So what are my takeaways?

Kids can always do more than we think they can

It’s so exciting to see the personal growth in those “intangibles”: leadership, responsibility, teamwork, creativity, problem solving.

It’s also exciting, of course, to see growth in the “tangibles”: engineering, programming, research, technology.

Robotics is, in my experience, the #1 gateway to advancing skills in STEM. It’s project or problem-based learning at its absolute finest.

I would love to expand not only our middle school program, but somehow make it available to our upper schoolers who are so inclined.

I was also very touched by my conversations with parents of my students, who expressed profound gratitude for the opportunities this afforded their children, and a willingness to help make our robotics program be everything it could and should be.

I don’t know what the future holds for robotics at my school, but I feel much more excited about the possibilities today than I did a week ago. Go Cougarbots!